§ COLONEL SYKESsaid, he rose pursuant to notice, to ddvoeate the expediency of enabling British subjects born in India to compete on the same footing as other British subjects for public employment under the Crown. Previous to 1833 very little attention had been paid to education 1380 in British India, but a clause having been inserted in the 3rd and 4th William IV., to the effect that no Native of India, or any natural-born subject of His Majesty, should, by reason only of his religion, place of birth, or colour, be held to be disabled from holding office under the East India Company, a great stimulus was given to the Natives of India to fit themselves for public employment. Schools were accordingly established throughout the country and subsequently cottages were founded, and in 1845, when Lord Hardinge was Governor General, there were under the Government of Bengal no less than fifty-one educational institutions. In that year Lord Hardinge issued a Proclamation, in which it was set forth that in every possible case a preference would be given in the selection of candidates for employment in the public service to those who had been educated in the institutions thus established. Numbers had flocked to the schools and colleges throughout the country, stimulated by that assurance, and they did find employment. In 1854 three Natives of Bengal were sent to England by the Government to be educated at the London University. One of them, Chuckerbutty, carried away the gold medal from all competitors, and was now physician to the medical college at Calcutta. Others trod in his steps at their own expense or that of their relatives. Ten students came over from Madras, and three from Bengal, all of whom obtained their degrees in medicine and their diplomas in surgery, not to speak of other honours, and, as rewards for their professional acquirements, were appointed by the Directors of the East India Company to their regular gradation Military Medical Service as assistant surgeons, and can, therefore, rise with their European brethren to the highest grades of the medical service. Such was the state of things when the Act of 1858 was passed transferring the Government of India to the Crown, and when Her Gracious Majesty declared in a Proclamation that it was her will, as far as might be, that all her subjects, of whatever race or creed, should be fairly and impartially admitted to offices in the Royal service, the duties of which they might be qualified by their education, ability, and integrity faithfully to discharge, and to give the Natives the means of reaching the highest intellectual status, Universities were established in Bengal, Madras, and Bombay, with the usual facilities, curriculum and profes- 1381 sional staff, and with power to confer degrees. List November the Indian students in England saw an official advertisement that on the 18th of February there would be a competitive examination for the office of assistant surgeon in the Royal Army. Those who considered themselves qualified made the necessary application at the War Office, and were all appointed to go up for examination at the period specified in the advertisement. They even got tickets of admission, but two days before the examination they received a communication from Dr. Gibson, Director General of the Medical Department, requesting them to call at his office. They obeyed, and were informed that for the future all employment in Her Majesty's medical service would be for general service, and not for local service in India, and that consequently they could not be allowed to compete. Equally astonished and disappointed they remonstrated, calling attention to the fact that many Natives were now in the regular medical service of the Crown in India, but their remonstrances were in vain, they were told that such was the decision; but bow that decision arose at the eleventh hour he (Colonel Sykes) could not say. Matters remained in this state until lie presented a petition from Dr. Thompson, one of the rejected candidates to the House, in which he complained of the injustice, of his prospects being blighted, and the very large sum be had expended upon his education in India and England being wasted. In consequence of this petition and of the question raised by him in that House it was decided to send two of the candidates—Dr. Thompson and Dr. Goodall—before a medical board, consisting of Dr. Gibson, Dr. Liddle, and Sir Ronald Martin. These gentlemen reported in general terms that it was their deliberate opinion, founded on experience, that the Native and mixed races of India and other tropical countries would never be able to sustain for any length of time the climate of our northern regions; and they added that Dr. Thompson and Dr. Goodall, though without any marked bodily defect, were constitutionally unfit for service in the various climates in which the British army was called upon to serve. Now, the fact was that Dr. Goodall was not an Asiatic, for his father was an officer in the army, and his mother was a daughter of an half-caste; so that he was three-fourths European. He was sent home in childhood, and had lived nine years in 1382 Scotland, where he was educated without his heath suffering in the slightest degree from the climate. Dr. Thompson, similarly, had passed the last winter in England, one of the most severe experienced for many years past, without a day's illness. He (Colonel Sykes) would beg to read to the House an extract from a letter addressed to him by a general officer of the name of Fraser residing at Pisa, a perfect stranger, but who had read an account of Mr. Thompson's case in the public papers. He stated that he had formerly commanded the 78th Highlanders, and had for many years in the regiment four Natives of tropical climates, and they were amongst the healthiest men in his regiment. If Indians were to be refused public employment, on the ground that they were unfit to serve in cold climates, the same objection should exclude from the service of the Crown the sons of civil and military servants born in India. Moreover, if Natives were not to be employed in cold climates on account of their health breaking down, there is sad experience that European troops should not be sent to a tropical climate for the same reason. But he altogether discarded the question of colour or race; he called upon the House to affirm the principle that Her Majesty's subjects, whether black or white, or of any intermediate hue, were entitled to the civil rights of other British subjects. The injustice done in excluding these Natives of India from competition for employment in the public service was not confined to the candidates themselves. He had a letter from the father of one, and who was also the uncle of another of these gentlemen stating that ho had been ruined by sending his son and nephew to England, on the faith of an Act of Parliament and the Queen's Proclamation. It had cost him from 10,000 to 12,000 rupees, and he could not believe that a British Parliament and a British public would give their consent to a wrong so flagrant. If Natives of India were admitted to compete there was no necessity to send them to Canada or other cold climates. As a mere question of humanity, it was necessary to have acclimatized persons as medical officers to the European troops in India, because tropical diseases could only be successfully treated by those who had acquired considerable experience with regard to them. Ten per cent of the strength of English regiments sent to India died within the first year after arrival, chiefly 1383 from a want of knowledge on the part of the surgeons who had accompanied the regiments from Europe as to the treatment of tropical diseases, and as they acquired that knowledge the percentage of deaths fell to 7, 6, 5, and even less per cent annually. On the ground, therefore, of humanity, they should have a permanent medical service in India, thoroughly acquainted with and competent to deal with tropical diseases. He looked with some anxiety to the consequences of disappointing the expectations which had been held out to the Natives of India? We were spending £279,000 a year in educating the people of that country, and with what object? Attaining a high intellectual standard, and feeling that they had the rights of British subjects, it was fatuous to believe there would not be discontent, disgust, and resentment, if the Natives were debarred from serving the Crown anywhere, or if confined to India, that their progress was limited to subordinate rank and paltry salaries of a few pounds per mensem. They would look forward as they had a right to do, to gradation rise in the service of the Crown, and it was his earnest hope that the Secretary of State for India would make such arrangements as would open to the Natives such a system of gradation rise in the medical and other services of India. He asked him to fulfil to the Natives those promises which were held out to them by the Act of Parliament and the Queen's Proclamation. He begged to move the Resolutions:—
That on all occasions when Candidates are invited to compete for public employment under the Crown, British Subjects born in India should be allowed to compete on the same footing as other British Subjects.
§ MR. LAYARDsaid, he rose to second the Motion. The question was one of very great importance. It was twofold, first whether or not the subjects of Her Majesty the Queen, born in India, should be allowed to compete for employment in the public service, and, secondly, whether the good faith of this country should be maintained He had presented a Petition from one of these gentlemen (Mr. Colah) belonging to that race who chiefly devoted themselves to mercantile pursuits, and were amongst the most intelligent and industrious of the people in India—the Parsees. That gentleman came to England with the object of competing for the medical service of the army. He passed the College of Surgeons in London, and the College of Phy- 1384 sicians at Aberdeen, but when ho presented himself for the competitive examination amongst the candidates for employment in the army he was told that, being a Native of India, be could not be allowed to compete. He remonstrated, and the War Office so far gave way that they said they would allow him to compete if he chose to serve as an army surgeon at Sierra Leone. He replied, with great dignity, that he was prepared to take service in any part of Her Majesty's dominions to which his duty might call him; but that he declined to compete if any conditions not authorized by the usual regulations were attached to his employment. It was no use talking of the constitutional unfitness of Natives of India to serve in northern climates; they might as well restrict the competition of Europeans for service in India because Englishmen were known to complain of their livers there. In the Queen's Proclamation the words were most distinct. There was no qualification as regarded race, colour, constitution, or anything else. Every subject of Her Majesty going up to compete had a right, if successful, to be employed in the public service. But the excuse of incapacity from constitution to serve in northern climates did not hold good, as Parsees were settled in all parts of the world, and enjoyed perfectly good health. It was said that medical gentlemen of colour would not be employed by Englishwomen. His experience did not lead him to adopt that view; even the Turks made no distinction of colour, and he had known negroes high in the Turkish public service. But there were cases of gentlemen who had not been allowed to compete for the medical service in the army because their great-grandmothers happened to have a tinge of Indian blood. There was the case of Dr. Thompson, who claimed to be as good a Scotchman as any beyond the Tweed. His mother was an European, but his great-grandmother had a tinge of colour, which was sufficient to exclude him from competition. There could be no doubt that a distinct promise had been held out to the Natives of India, and he would ask whether it was just or politic to depart from that promise? One gentleman had expended between £600 and £700 in educating himself and coming to this country to qualify himself to compete, and when he complained on being rejected, be was offered £200. Another gentleman, a Brahmin, said he was a ruined man; he had lost his caste by coining to Europe, 1385 and could not be received again by his family. The young Brahmins gave as a reason for not seeking to acquire European knowledge that, if they came to England they gave up their caste in India, while they were not received here upon the same footing as Englishmen. Such policy was calculated to do much mischief, and he hoped the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for India, who was, he believed, sincere in his desire to improve the condition of the Natives of that country, would use his best efforts to do justice to the gentlemen whose case they were now considering.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That," &c.
MR. T. G. BARINGdid not yield to either the gallant Colonel or to the hon. Member for Southwark in his wish for the education of the people of India, but this question was not connected with that subject. The second part of the Motion before the House was simply a censure on the Secretary of State for War for having prohibited certain gentlemen, Natives of India, from competing for the office of assistant surgeon in the regular army. This was not a question of employment in India, but of employment in all parts of the world. The ground for the prohibition was a letter addressed to the Secretary of State for War by the Secretary of State for India, in which he said that Natives of India were unsuited for the general service of the British Army, and that they ought not to be permitted to compete for the office of assistant surgeon in that army. If they were admitted they might be sent to parts of the world where their health would fail them, and at an early age they would be thrown upon the half-pay list. There were also two or three gentlemen as to whom there was a doubt whether they should be considered Natives of India; those cases were referred to three most eminent medical men—Sir John Liddell, Sir Ronald Martin, and Dr. Gibson—who described them as men of colour with Asiatic features, and said that, although there was nothing to preclude them from employment in a tropical climate, yet they were constitutionally unfit for service in various northern climates where the British Army was called upon to serve. Was it possible, in the face of that opinion, for the Secretary of State for War to allow these gentlemen to compete for the general medical service of the army? He did not think the House could agree in the first part of the Motion of the hon. 1386 and gallant Member, which was one of the most abstract ones which had ever been brought forward. It pledged the House in effect to this among other things—that Natives of India should be entitled to compete for the Artillery and Engineers. If that Resolution were carried the result would be that persons notoriously unfit by constitution for the general service of the army would be admitted into the scientific branches of the army. With regard to the recent Proclamation, it was to be recollected that it was issued in India and addressed to the Natives of that country; it obviously referred to the employment of Natives of India in India, and by no twisting of it could it be made to apply to the general service of this country. He, however, admitted that the case of these gentlemen was a distressing one. In 1853, the medical service of India was open to public competition by Act of Parliament, but last year, in consequence of the amalgamation of the two armies, the Secretary of State for India thought it no longer necessary to keep up a separate medical service for India. Those who before the change had prepared themselves to compete for that service were allowed to compete in certain cases for the general medical service, but those who were constitutionally unfit for it were excluded. It appeared, however, from the papers before the House, that the Secretary of State for India, in Council, had taken steps to secure for the Native gentlemen who had thus been disappointed in their expectations suitable employment in India, and had allowed them a sum to defray the cost of their passage to that country. Upon these grounds he hoped the House would not agree to the Motion.
MR. J. B. SMITHsaid, it appeared the real reason why these gentlemen were rejected was that they had Asiatic features. He would ask the hon. Gentleman if there never had been a Member of that House who had Asiatic features? These gentlemen were British subjects, and there was nothing to prevent any one of them sitting as a Member of that House if any constituency chose to elect him. In fact they had had an East Indian a Member of that House, Mr. Dyce Sombre. It appeared to him that the Proclamation of the Queen was a delusion. It was a disgrace to the Government that that Proclamation, which was received with such delight in India, was not honestly carried out. As to Asiatics not being able to serve in a cold cil- 1387 mate, they were much more able to do so than Englishmen were to serve in India.
CAPTAIN JERVISsaid, that he did not believe that the frame of an Asiatic was calculated to endure the inclemency of many of our colonies. He should have no objection, as an officer, to mix on brotherly terms with the Natives of India; but he doubted whether the English private soldiers would allow a "dark skin" to command them in this country. There was a way, however, of giving employment to Native Indians through which they might attain eminence and considerable positions. Every branch of service in India required extending, and by inducing Natives to come over and study for the Medical Service much good might be effected. But after the statement which had been made by the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Baring) he trusted that the hon. and gallant Officer (Colonel Sykes) would not press this question to a division.
§ COLONEL SYKESsaid, there was at that moment in the north-west province a deputy collector who was educated in St. Petersburg, and made an officer of artillery there, which showed that the Russian Government was more liberal than ours was. With regard to the Natives of India being incapable of serving in cold climates, if his hon. Friend were to look to the mortality of the Guards in London, he would find that no Natives could suffer so much as did the Guards. He found that out of 1,333 total deaths from all causes, 668 were from consumption, and 350 were invalided from the same cause. Was there anything that the Natives of India could fall into equal to that? He should not trouble the House to divide.
§ Motion, by leave, withdrawn.